$60, at-home night vision gets cheaper, better

Ars Technica takes a look at the next-generation of night-vision, in a toy. …

Sometimes you find that your lifestyle, or (in some cases) your job, means that you parent somewhat differently than may be the norm. This rare moment of self-reflection came when I was standing in my daughter's room, watching her sleep through a pair of night-vision goggles. This way, I can make sure she actually is sleeping without turning on a light and perhaps waking her, or alerting her to my presence as I bear witness to whatever level of shenanigans she's getting up to.

I wonder, idly, if there is enough ambient light to see the outline of my head. I then wonder if this is how alien abduction memories begin.

Ars Technica reviewed JAKKS Pacific's first pass at night vision technology back in September of last year, but that design had a few flaws. The goggles strapped onto your face too tightly and only allowed one eye to see what was around you in the dark. This made it almost impossible to move normally, and it reduced the toy from a tactical advantage to a fun novelty.

With this second stab at the design, JAKKS has fixed many of these problems: now the goggles operate more like binoculars. They fit around your neck, and they're brought to your face only when you need to see something in the dark. Both eyes also now have a screen in front of them, with a dial to adjust interpupillary distance, so you get a nice, clear, large image of what's going on in front of you.

This makes the product, dare I say, useful? If you don't mind carrying around a large black lump of plastic with you that looks vaguely threatening, this thing has all sorts of uses. My apartment building has a scary-looking staircase going down to the basement entrance outside, and you have to walk away from it when taking out your garbage. Last night I peeked over the railing with the goggles on, peering down into the jet black. All I saw were bum-leavins', and no ninja-attackers. I could rest easy.

Keep in mind that these products don't use true night-vision; instead they operate as an infra-red flashlight, with an optical sensor that can pick up infra-red light. That means that with the goggles on you can see the light coming from your Wii sensor bar, or from your remote control, and if you look at another set of goggles you'll see a blaze of light; it's not like you could get two sets and hunt a friend who also has one; you'd look like beacons to each other when switched on. The goggles also take five AA batteries, making them expensive to feed. The good news is the product is now less expensive, with the binocular-style coming in at $59.99.

The EyeClops Night Vision 2.0 goggles are a fun, inexpensive toy with many neat uses... especially if you're the only person with a set and you're taking part in a midnight Nerf-war, which is something you should plan. The binocular design is a big improvement from the strap-on design of the first set, which took away a large amount of your equilibrium. This is one of those rare times a company makes a product cheaper, yet better.

"Sometimes you find that your lifestyle or, in some cases, your job, means that you parent somewhat differently than may be the norm. This rare moment of self-reflection came when I was standing in my daughter's room, watching her sleep through a pair of night-vision goggles."

I generally don't judge others, especially when it comes to how they raise their kids. But I have to say something here - either you've come up with one of the lamest justifications to buy yourself a toy, or you've crossed the line from "parenting" to "downright creepy". Either way, the idea of you standing in your daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles, watching her while she sleeps is incredibly disturbing. Seems like this is guaranteed to encourage the kind of behavior in her that you're trying to prevent.

Honey, you know my birthday is coming up! @dogzilla, I kind of think Ben had a true Geek moment.... As for my self, my oldest just got a boy friend. Time to get a pair and get that shotgun off the rack.

I generally don't judge others, especially when it comes to how they raise their kids. But I have to say something here - either you've come up with one of the lamest justifications to buy yourself a toy, or you've crossed the line from "parenting" to "downright creepy". Either way, the idea of you standing in your daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles, watching her while she sleeps is incredibly disturbing. Seems like this is guaranteed to encourage the kind of behavior in her that you're trying to prevent.

He's got a newborn, like a couple months old. If he was checking on her by the hallway light, it would be a touching parenting moment. There's no creepy.

I generally don't judge others, especially when it comes to how they raise their kids. But I have to say something here - either you've come up with one of the lamest justifications to buy yourself a toy, or you've crossed the line from "parenting" to "downright creepy". Either way, the idea of you standing in your daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles, watching her while she sleeps is incredibly disturbing. Seems like this is guaranteed to encourage the kind of behavior in her that you're trying to prevent.

He's got a newborn, like a couple months old. If he was checking on her by the hallway light, it would be a touching parenting moment. There's no creepy.

This!

My 5 month old daughter will occasionally squirm around in her crib such that the infrared video monitor can still see her, but my wife and I can't tell if she's actually still breathing due to how she has positioned herself. Trying to creep into her room with the output of a flashlight mostly blocked by my hand is quite tedious and is almost guaranteed to wake her up. This "toy" would solve that problem nicely.

You would have a soft lighting in a baby's room so you will hardly need a night vision to watch over your babies. That said, Dogzilla comment did creep me out more than what I was reading out of the article. I don't know what you are thinking, but can't you just read it with a bit innocent mind set?

I don't find this all that useful and I am worried about the privacy implication of this type of device. I think this will quickly become a problem once this is available widely.

Originally posted by Zetetic Apparatchik:I can't get over the fucking double-standards. It's fine for Mr. Kuchera to hang about in his daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles but when I do it, it's all sirens and metal.

So even with a screen for each eye, does this really help with depth perception when there's only one IR camera? I would think that a single image would still look flat (like a big movie screen). I'm sure it's better than the previous model with only one screen, but still...

I generally don't judge others, especially when it comes to how they raise their kids. But I have to say something here - either you've come up with one of the lamest justifications to buy yourself a toy, or you've crossed the line from "parenting" to "downright creepy". Either way, the idea of you standing in your daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles, watching her while she sleeps is incredibly disturbing. Seems like this is guaranteed to encourage the kind of behavior in her that you're trying to prevent.

He's got a newborn, like a couple months old. If he was checking on her by the hallway light, it would be a touching parenting moment. There's no creepy.

This!

My 5 month old daughter will occasionally squirm around in her crib such that the infrared video monitor can still see her, but my wife and I can't tell if she's actually still breathing due to how she has positioned herself. Trying to creep into her room with the output of a flashlight mostly blocked by my hand is quite tedious and is almost guaranteed to wake her up. This "toy" would solve that problem nicely.

Definitely no creepy.

No creepy. It's leveraging technology for better parental management!

I laughed our loud reading the article opening, remembering what it was like when my kids were babies, and all of the sleep deprivation and new-parent anxiety that went with that time. Sneaking into their room to check on them, trying my best to not wake them up, so that I could get that many more minutes of sleep myself. Any parent that has had to care for sleeping babies can readily sympathize.

But, I really could have used a HAZMAT suit for changing diapers for when the poo volcano erupted.

I like the idea but I'm betting someone moderately skilled at hacking toys could do a job of disassembling the unit and remounting it on some swim goggles or something for hands-free operation. After all, using one hand just to see limits your opportunities for creepy nocturnal mischief!

My apartment building has a scary-looking staircase going down to the basement entrance outside, and you have to walk away from it when taking out your garbage. Last night I peeked over the railing with the goggles on, peering down into the jet black. All I saw were bum-leavins', and no ninja-attackers. I could rest easy.

This brings to mind a question. Ninjas don't use night-vision goggles, at least not OG ninjas. How do they see in the dark? Someone should research that.

My apartment building has a scary-looking staircase going down to the basement entrance outside, and you have to walk away from it when taking out your garbage. Last night I peeked over the railing with the goggles on, peering down into the jet black. All I saw were bum-leavins', and no ninja-attackers. I could rest easy.

This brings to mind a question. Ninjas don't use night-vision goggles, at least not OG ninjas. How do they see in the dark? Someone should research that.

Maybe their pirate adversaries self-luminesce?

I suspect Ninjas spend years of effort on heightening all their senses such that they are not dependent on any single one.

Originally posted by dogzilla:I generally don't judge others, especially when it comes to how they raise their kids. But I have to say something here - either you've come up with one of the lamest justifications to buy yourself a toy, or you've crossed the line from "parenting" to "downright creepy". Either way, the idea of you standing in your daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles, watching her while she sleeps is incredibly disturbing. Seems like this is guaranteed to encourage the kind of behavior in her that you're trying to prevent.

Timor licensiat conturbat me.

Do you have kids? Don't seem like you do or you would not think anything creepy about what Ben did. The whole idea is to not wake the child while you are trying to see if they are asleep.

Originally posted by Zetetic Apparatchik:I can't get over the fucking double-standards. It's fine for Mr. Kuchera to hang about in his daughter's room wearing night-vision goggles but when I do it, it's all sirens and metal.

There's much more than kids to watch at night. My patio door gives on a several acres natural park with a tree line of mature oaks and maple trees at less than 20 feet from the house. I've always wondered what the dog is barking at in the middle of the night. I assume retina reflection in mammals would yield a somewhat farther reach than 50 ft, no ?

We live on the edge of a wooded area, and use night vision to watch the incredible number of critters that wander around at night. With a few Audubon Field Guides, it's better than watching the discovery channel.

I find all the comments about the one-eye model being unuseable and having only one camera messing up your depth perception to be kind of funny. Of course that could be because I've been blind in my right eye since birth.

Camcorders? Thats how I did it. I bought a camcorder for $8 at a garage sale. It was cheap because it could no longer record to cassettes. Coincidentally it looked the same as the one Marty used in Back to the Future, which only added to how cool it seemed.

To my surprise, that camcorder could see infared light. Afterwards I learned that most camcorders could.

I built a simple IR flashlight from a radio shack kit and started using it as a nightvision monocular.

You are aware of course that there have been IR video baby monitors on the market for a while, haven't you? With those, you don't have to leave your bed to check what that weird noise was. How many times I've been able to check that the sudden panic in the middle of the night was nothing important and was able to get back to sleep, I cannot tell you. You can even distinguish very subtle movements of your baby with those and calm down the most paranoid of parents.

Originally posted by Ben Kuchera:How would that help me with my ninja problem? Not to mention Werewolves.

You really should think before you speak.

Ninjas are more of a problem then werewolves because you have to worry about them all the time, but werewolves only when its a full moon. About the ninja problem, I doubt NVGs will help you spot them. They will see which direction you are looking and disappear into the background or a cloud of smoke anyway.

But with the goggles he can see the cloud of smoke and know that they're onto him. Of course he could just do the smart thing and assume that ninjas are always onto him. But that doesn't involve night vision goggles.

This comment was edited by Wheels Of Confusion on August 11, 2009 02:53

This comment was edited by Wheels Of Confusion on August 11, 2009 02:53

This comment was edited by Wheels Of Confusion on August 11, 2009 02:53